


Fear

by fajrdrako



Category: Vorkosigan novels by Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-03
Updated: 2013-06-03
Packaged: 2017-12-13 21:31:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/829098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fajrdrako/pseuds/fajrdrako
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for <a href="http://theatricalmuse.net/">theatrical muse</a>: Aral Vorkosigan's fears.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fear

**Aral - What are you afraid of?**

~ ~ ~

I am afraid of losing my honour.

I don't even know what this means.  Am I an honourable man?  I have found for my country; I serve my Emperor as best I can, in matters of political, military and personal needs; I respect my father and try to do nothing that would shame the name of Vorkosigan.

But I fear sometimes that I have heaped dishonour upon dishonour.  I have done it with such care that it seems no one has noticed.  My father, though he may scold disapprovingly in private, remains deeply proud of me.  "I don't deserve it, " I said to him  once, and he grunted. "It doesn't matter. You are my son."

What was I to make of that?  I am not my brother.  I'm sure I have given my father grey hairs before his time, and probably sleepless nights.  Not because he is ashamed of me, but because he loves me.

Was it dishonourable when I, as a boy, hid under the piano instead of dying with my mother?

Was it dishonourable that I gave Mad Yuri a simple death, instead of the ritual suffering he deserved?

Was it dishonorable to refuse the Imperium when it was offered to me?

Was it dishonourable to push Ges against the wall that autumn day, to kiss him, full of laughter an arousal - groping in his trousers, suggesting  games we'd never neither of us yet played with anyone?  And afterwards to do - not that, but something similar - the next day, and the next, in an exciting cycle of sexual discovery.

And then, to marry his sister. Was that dishonour?

To kill her lovers, and escape the charge of murder by silence - how honourable was that?

I am the last of the Vorkosigans. I once said to the Emperor, "I make a sorry end to a noble line."

He laughed and said, "You respect them too much, boy.  Greedy cutthroats, every one of them.  Yes, and my ancestors too, don't look at me like that.  You're better than most of them put together."

Our Emperor may be a deluded fool, but he made me feel better.  


  


\- - -


End file.
